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Obliteration (Part One)

Everything was black-blue.

The storm clouds were suffocating, hanging low over the bloodstained earth. Every step the horse moved was listless and slow, like wading through oblivion itself.

And the world was black-blue. 

But it was also orange-red. It was charring and bright and enflamed behind the clouds of thunder. 

But that was not the color of death. Death was black-blue. Death was black and grey and blue. Death was obliteration.

Faramir knew death.

He didn't call himself a hero. Heroes were steadfast and unwavering. They were silver-gold. Silver and gold and crowned in roses.

He was a soldier, crowned in thorns. Soldiers existed for one sole purpose-- to die. And he was to die today, to lose his shambling along the edge of the knife.

Faramir had seen it many times. 

Death, that is.

For everyone died. It was the black-blue way of the world. The black-grey-blue oblivion of vanquished hopes and dreams.

His mother died.

His brother died.

Faramir knew he would die.

For he had seen death. But never before did he imagine he would willingly ride straight into his own. His childish dreaming never imagined he would fall into the black-blue this way.

It seemed difficult to breathe as the clouds claimed the darkening sky, covering the sun. His vision was pained with smears of inky-grey... was this acceptance?

The color of an empire falling?

Perhaps it was because he did not plan on returning. One look into the pits of his father's emotionless eyes and Faramir was ready to fall into the abyss. He was ready to die.

Because his soul had faded with his brother. His heart had died with the final trumpet of the Horn of Gondor.

With the white-gold fading of the only person he loved.

Faramir wondered faintly if his father would have sent Boromir to his death, like Denethor had sent him. Perhaps if he would have just gotten the object...

Gold-red-orange. The object.

That's what Faramir called it, an object. A trinket, nothing to obsess on. For perhaps if he kept its true nature from his mind, the pull of the object would fade.

He would not fall prey to the trinket, not today.

But... but not tomorrow either. For he would fall today. He would die.

Faramir had known sadness growing up. Pain, the red-purple-blue kind of sadness of never being good enough. Of never once being what his father wanted.

But today was different.

Today was grey. Simply grey.

The horses trudged on through oblivion and he could sense it in his men too. Their souls were grey and black. Their faces were empty and hopeless.

For they were soldiers, not heroes. They walked the broken glass and held their sword up to the blood-bathed sunset.

And they were going to die today. Black-blue.

Black-blue.

Everything was black-blue. Black and blue and orange and red. 

Suddenly, the air was shattered by a curdling battle cry. Everything turned red and the wind screamed with pity for the soldiers below.

Faramir saw the orcs. His horse whinnied and pulled against the reins but Faramir only gripped them tighter.

Everything was red.

He was going to die today. His father would shed no tears and his city would fall at his back. Black-blue would lay claim to the stained earth.

Black and blue and scarlet red.

Then Faramir rode hard, but there was no battle cry in the air. Nothing but the jeering of orcs and the whistling of arrows. 

One man fell. Grey-black. Then another. 

Faramir didn't reach the orc lines. He was riding and then... and then... then he wasn't.

Red flashed before his eyes and the force of the arrow sent him tumbling off his horse. The ground met his face with a blur of green-brown and everything spun in and out of black.

Something warmed his tunic. 

Blood.

Scarlet red.

Faintly, Faramir wondered if he should feel terror. After all, what did dying men feel? What did... what did dead men feel?

Nothing. They felt nothing and everything would be black.

Not blue. Not red. Not green and not yellow. 

Blinking slowly, Faramir gazed at the grey-blue sky and realized it would be the last thing he would ever see. It would give him the last air he would ever breathe.

Perhaps Boromir faded gazing at the very same sky. Maybe... maybe it was his brother's face among the grey. 

Watching his little brother die.

Nothing.

The world turned red and orange, then blue and black. Then it was nothing. For there is no color for nothing... and Faramir felt nothing.

He felt nothing.

Blue-black. The blue-black obliteration of dying souls.

A/N: Uhmm... not sure where I went with this one. I read something today about colors describing emotions and feelings and had the sudden urge to create it into a work... then somehow, we got here.

I plan on writing a part two, as Faramir did not fully die and came back. But around 800 words I didn't want to wander too long, so I figured I'd do a part one and part two.

Sorry if this was strange. I have a strange mind today. Finals are killing me. But... I hope to see you all in part two (at some point)! Thank all you guys for your time, you guys are amazeballs!